Chapter 677 - Snow Wolf
CONTENT WARNING: BLOOD & GORE & ANIMAL ABUSE
Tang Si stomped onwards in righteous anger, a wooden branch in her hand. As she walked she waved the branch around energetically, hitting the plants around her as she complained angrily, “Damned Mo Ruo, stinky Mo Ruo. If this grand dame didn’t like you, I would definitely skin you alive! In what way am I not good? Why do you disdain me so?!”
She got angrier the more she thought about it. “You just wait. Sooner or later, I’ll have you kneeling in front of this grand dame crying and begging to take you in. I just don’t believe that I can’t even deal…” with you.
Before Tang Si could finish her words, she suddenly stopped in her tracks and stopped moving her arms as well. Her ears twitched and she leaned forward as if she had heard some movement. High alert! Tang Si tossed the branch aside and continued forward gingerly.
There was the glow of a fire in front of her. As she approached, the light turned brighter and the sound of other people also grew. There were blood-curdling shrieks, wolf howls, and some people laughing out loud.
Instinct from traversing the mountains over the years told her that this could not be a good thing! Tang Si hid behind a large tree and looked in the direction of a little stream. She was instantly stunned.
There was a roaring bonfire by the banks of the little stream. Gathered around it were a dozen or so muscular men wearing tiger pelts with one shoulder bared and their bodies covered with tattoos. Beside a stout and stocky man with his hair worn loose was a large cage that housed over a dozen snow-white wolves. The wolves howled and rammed against the metal bars of the cage until they were covered in wounds, their white fur stained with streaks of blood.
“Let them go, I beg you…” Four people tied up in ropes begged desperately, their eyes filled with tears.
However, those men didn’t take any notice of them. Some of them tossed more wood into the bonfire merrily, while others busied themselves with getting water from the stream.
Instead, some of them men dragged a wolf from the cage, took out a dagger and stabbed it into the wolf’s stomach, splitting it open as fresh blood poured out. It was extremely unsightly.
They killed several snow wolves just like that in quick succession.
The fellow killing the wolves had both hands drenched in blood. He laughed in merriment and even spread his five fingers and stuck them into his mouth to lick the blood off them. His actions were truly nauseating.
Tang Si watched helplessly with a hand over her mouth as these noble snow wolves were skinned alive, their bloody bodies skewered by a wooden rod and put over the fire to roast. As she took in this scene, she dry heaved a few times and almost vomited.
The people that had been tied up were forced to look on powerlessly as the snow wolves that they raised had their bellies sliced open alive and skinned. They wailed in grief, “Don’t kill them, I beg you, let my wolves go. I’ll give you whatever you want, I beg you…”
They shouted themselves hoarse but those perverse men remained indifferent and instead guffawed with laughter, revealing a mouthful of bloodied teeth. How bizarre and terrifying.
Tang Si had grown up on the grasslands and knew well that snow wolves were the most loyal kind of animal. When she was a child, she had also kept one. However, one day when she brought her snow wolf out to Tianshan, they met with an avalanche and the wolf had been buried alive, unable to escape. From that day forth, she never kept a wolf again.
Thus, when she saw what they were doing, she was both pained and furious. She grit her teeth, clenched her hands and stomped fiercely on the ground, accidentally breaking a twig below her foot. A crisp crack rang out.
The people by the stream had very sharp ears. When they suddenly heard a disturbance, all of them went on alert, looking in her direction. Luckily, Tang Si was behind a large tree, outside of the firelight and in the darkness. Only a vague shadow could be seen, and nothing could be clearly made out.
Tang Si hid behind the tree and held her breath. Although she was used to showing off, she wasn’t brainless. Even though she considered herself skilled at martial arts, just the fact that she didn’t have the advantage of numbers meant that she would surely suffer a loss instead.
Someone shouted out, “Who’s there?”
There was no answer.
“Go over to take a look.” Several of the men shouldered their huge sabres and approached her direction with a torch in hand.
Tang Si took a deep breath and thought to herself, I surely won’t be able to escape them. Why not go all in and kill however many I can? Her hand crept towards her waist and grasped her whip, intending to bite down and throw herself into the fray.
However, just as she was about to step out from behind the tree, a hand came from behind her and covered her mouth. Then, the person leapt upwards as light as a feather to land in the branches of the tree.
The two figures were thus hidden by the tree leaves.
Tang Si was still struggling when a voice sounded by her ear, “Stop moving if you don’t want to die.”
It’s Mo Ruo! She immediately quietened and Mo Ruo released his hand over her mouth. She turned back and saw Mo Ruo’s face just inches away from her own. “Why are you here?” She asked softly.
Mo Ruo didn’t answer her, looking tensely below them instead. Those men were standing there, waving their torches around searching for people. “There’s nobody!”
“Maybe it was the wind. Making a fuss over nothing.”
“Who cares if there was someone, let’s eat some wolf first!”
“Let’s go, quickly go kill the wolves.” The men let down their guard and returned to the bonfire.
On the tree, the two of them also let out a sigh of relief. Tang Si finally realised that he was hugging her tightly from behind, and her previous anger and tension were swept away just like that. She lowered her head and started smiling secretly.
“You still dare to smile? Do you know how much danger you were in just now? If I didn’t come, you would have been turned into a side dish for them!” Mo Ruo chided softly.
She stopped smiling and pouted, “I didn’t want that either!”
“Alright, let’s go back quickly.”
“Go back?” She turned her head and pointed angrily towards the little stream, “Didn’t you see all those people killing the snow wolves? It’s really too perverse and cruel! If we just turned away like this, what would happen to those snow wolves and those people that have been tied up? If we left, they might also get killed by those people.”
“There’s nothing much the two of us can do. We can go save them, but we must also protect ourselves. If anything happened to us, how could we save others? Let’s go back and discuss with Jing Rong first before we decide what to do.”
That’s true. They couldn’t do anything at all with just the two of them. If they rushed in unprepared they would only die.
Mo Ruo hugged her close again and landed back on the ground lightly before leading her away.
When they returned to the campsite, everyone was still talking and laughing idly. However, when they saw them hurry back with pale faces, the atmosphere immediately turned serious.
“What happened?” Jing Rong asked.
Tang Si panted and pointed her finger back in the woods, “Over there… There are many people killing wolves, and maybe people as well. Quick, all of you quickly follow me there or it’s going to be too late.”
Follow what where? They didn’t quite understand.
Jing Rong turned towards Mo Ruo. “Just what happened?”
Mo Ruo replied calmly, “There’s a bunch of people over by the stream. By the looks of it, they should be people that have been living in the woods for years. They captured a few people and dozens of snow wolves. Right now they are skinning them one by one and roasting the wolves over the fire. The specifics of the situation is unclear.”
It’s actually such a disgusting matter!